Sylosis continues to be at the forefront of today’s metal scene. If you’re a fan of modern metal, chances are you’ve heard of Sylosis at one point or another. Their unique combination of thrash metal and melodic death metal has secured them positions on many of the biggest metal festivals around the world.
Their most recent album, Dormant Heart, shows that Sylosis continues to push the boundaries of metal. This is album number four from Sylosis, a band that is not afraid of musically branching out. The vocals on Dormant Heart are the biggest indicator. Josh Middleton arguably provides his most varied vocals from any Sylosis release. The album showcases his vocals branching out to include clean vocals on various tracks in combination to the prevalent use of unclean vocals. Two examples include “Overthrown” and “Quiescent,” where the clean vocals add more emotion to the tracks. While added emotion may not be something appreciated by all metal fans, it’s a new quality that showcases Sylosis’ willingness to experiment with their music.
While I applaud their experimentation, issues lie within song structure. Some of the album’s tracks suffer from moments of predictability, mainly during the thrashier verses. These moments fail to make the tracks stand out from other thrash songs. This normally wouldn’t be much of an issue; however, multiple tracks on the album utilize predictable verses. As a result, the album often feels repetitive. Individually, every track on the album is welcoming. But as an entire album, it gets tiring. I eventually found myself gravitating towards certain tracks on the album, instead of enjoying the album as a whole.
With all their strides in the metal world, it is hard not to comprehend the effort that Sylosis puts toward making each album unique. Their consistent effort with each release proves that the band is on a journey to make a mark on the modern metal scene. While many would argue that Dormant Heart does not live up to the hype the band built up with Edge of the Earth and Monolith, it is an album that deserves praise for its attempts to broaden what it means to be a modern metal band.
Haresh Kapadia